


Aftermath

by cadaveres



Category: Bungie Destiny, Destiny (Video Games), Destiny 2 - Fandom, Forsaken - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Darkness, Other, Self-Doubt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 08:27:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16082306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadaveres/pseuds/cadaveres
Summary: Guardians react to anguish differently. Where some find purpose, others find questions begging to be answered. Where some seek light, others find darkness.-Short story exploring the reactions of an awoken warlock and an exo hunter to the approaching darkness. Post-Forsaken.





	Aftermath

It was supposed to be a quiet evening. The Warlock had planned to leave the city late at night, sneak into the ruins and debris, and just sit by themselves, taking in the stillness of things before another turmoil could hit them. They needed the break; traces of darkness were starting to accumulate inside their eyes and that creeping doubt had again brought in the voices and guilt.

The Hunter noticed, of course. His friend had grown distant, secretive even, and he knew the least they needed was to be alone, not with those thoughts and those voices. So they followed. “You’re intruding.” Elpis would typically chime in on moments he thought of himself as grandiose, a hero; the Ghost knew exactly when he needed boundaries, but the Hunter was never good at respecting them.

“I’m not.”

“Projecting.”

“No.”

He followed close, but not too close to be noticed. He knew the Warlock had a knack for paranoia and their Ghost, Sennacherib, never helped with his overly cautious personality. “They will not like this.”

“You don’t know that.”

“You’re being selfish.”

Perhaps a little.

When he finally reached Earth, he quickly tracked his friend, knowing well enough that they wanted no disruptions and that often meant hiding in one of those lost sectors they never cared to share with anybody else. He found them perched atop a cliff, overseeing a chipped shard of the Traveler.

“Wait.” Elpis focused intently on the distant shape of the Warlock. “Don’t,” she concluded, looking sternly at the Hunter. “This is not good timing.”

The Warlock sat crossed-legged, face hidden by their hands, a few stray tears rolling down the gloomy star clusters of their usually bright nebulas. A sob escaped their lips and the Hunter knew this was definitely the moment, ignoring Elpis yet again.

He leaped, missing by a blink the edge, and fell.

“Great. Company.” Sennacherib had been too distracted by nearby Taken energies to be a reliable outlook. The Warlock quickly wiped away the rusted tears on their face and took a meditation stance, posing, pretending. “Definitely not gonna notice.” The Warlock shut their eyes and lowered their face to the ground, as if lost in thought.

“Guardian down.” Elpis sounded pleased and she made her way very slowly to the Hunter. “You need to stop trying these heroic antics.”

The Hunter’s second attempt wasn’t a deadly one, to the Warlock and Elpis’ disappointment. He brushed his cape, dropped next to the meditating Warlock. “Mind if I join?” He crossed his legs, imitating the Warlock’s stance.

“Oh you know what they say, the more the merrier.” Sennacherib moved to the Warlock’s left shoulder, narrowing his lenses at the sight of the Hunter. The Warlock felt anger rising from the pits of their stomach, but remained in place, eyes closed and lips slightly parted.

There was silence for a moment, a thing that Elpis found surprising, but the pleasant silence was short-lived as the Hunter began to shift on his seat, switching his legs from one position to another, keeping one optic opened, focused intently on the Warlock. He finally gave up when the Warlock sighed in annoyance.

“Do you think fallen Guardians get second chances?” The Warlock opened their eyes, sight still focused on the distant shard, and furrowed their brows in confusion. Their sight was swiftly blocked by a brightly colored cloak with the Hunter now standing right in front of them.

The Warlock sighed, looked at their Ghost, who seemed uninterested in the conversation, and finally asked, “Fallen Guardians?” They reached for the Hunter’s cloak and pulled it hard enough to force him back to the ground.

He landed gracefully by their friend’s side. “You know,” he started, grabbing a fistful of his cloak on his hand, twirling a part of it around his index finger. “Dead. Dead Guardians.” He pulled at the hood and covered his face in embarrassment, pulling his knees close to his chest in the process.

There was a long pause, which Sennacherib took as his queue to return to his sentry position. The Warlock shifted their weight into a more comfortable sitting position, moving slightly away from the Hunter and bringing their knees close to their chest, resting their face against their knees and looking intently at a particularly uninteresting spot on the ground.

“I don’t think that’s how the light works.”

The Hunter’s voice modulator did that little static noise the Warlock had come to associate with a tremble. He cleared his voice, slightly removed his hood from his optics, and met his friend’s cloudy eyes. “I thought you would say that.” He leaned closer to the Warlock, another boundary tossed aside, and rested his head on their shoulders. The Warlock stiffened and glared intensely at the shard.

Elpis joined Sennacherib, unsure of how to contribute to the conversation, as things of the light were but a _thing_ Ghosts did, not something they _knew_ about. The two Ghosts looked from above their Guardians, sharing nervous glances as the two sat in silence. “In a sense,” Sennacherib started, “You have a smart Guardian.”

Elpis’s optic widened with curiosity, sight intently focused on the red lenses of the other ghost.

“He can sense the twilight approaching, but he still looks for the light.” Sennacherib paused, focused his optic on the Warlock, and looked at them with sadness. “Instead of running head on to the dark.”

**Author's Note:**

> Con/crit greatly appreciated. I'm exploring with different character voices and I am happy with how this turned out.


End file.
